Data Acquisition Web

Ethernet is the most widely used local area network (LAN) technology. The original and most popular version of Ethernet supports a data transmission rate of 10 Mb/s. Newer versions of Ethernet called "Fast Ethernet" and "Gigabit Ethernet" support data rates of 100 Mb/s and 1 Gb/s (1000 Mb/s) to 10 Gb/s respectively. An Ethernet LAN may use coaxial cables, special grades of twisted pair wiring, or fiber optic cables. "Bus" and "Star" wiring configurations are supported. Ethernet devices compete for access to the network using a protocol called Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Detection (CSMA/CD).

Ethernet today is the IEEE standard 802.3. The original Ethernet designed with 10base5. The "10" stands for 10 megabytes per second. Base is the Baseband communications it uses. The "5" stands for a maximum distance of 500 meters to communicate with. Original Ethernet used coaxial wiring, while newer versions use twisted-pair cabling and optical fiber. There are several flavors of Ethernet, including 10Base2 (10 Mbps, 200 meters), 10BaseT (10 Mbps, 100 meters, twisted-pair), and 100BaseT (100 Mbps, 100 meter, twisted-pair), etc.